CAPACITOR CODE GUIDE FOR BEGINNER

    

                   CAPACITOR CODE GUIDE

This are devices that store charges. We have a.c and d.c capacitors. A.c capacitors are called starting capacitors in generators while d.c capacitors are those small  caps found in radios, TV sets, computers etc

TYPES OF CAPACITORS: 

1. Electrolytic capacitors 

2. Ceramics capacitors

3. Paper capacitors

4. Variable capacitors  

    When I first started doing electronics, capacitors ("caps") were a real puzzle, and I often just substituted them in a bread boarded circuit until I found one that worked. Finally it occurred to me to do up this chart. Now I have a way of  reading capacitance, which makes identifying capacitors much simpler.

A Farad is the measure of electronic capacitance.
Named in honor of scientist Michael Faraday , a pioneer in electronics and father of modern "ELECTRICITY"

  The Farad is a HUGE quantity, and most capacitors are only a fraction of a Farad.
BEAM projects typically use caps between .001uF and 47uF for timing, signal conditioning, and power filtering; and between 1000uF and 1F for storage in solar engines.

pF = picoFarad, 10-12 farad (that's one trillionth!) 1 uF = 1 000 000 pF

uF = microFarad (the letter u substitutes for the Greek letter micron) 1 F = 1 000 000 uF

mF = microFarad (not milliFarad as you'd expect) 1 F = 1 000 000 000 000 pF

  Capacitor values are usually standardized--.10,.22, .33, .47 and so on. However, you might occasionally find an unusual value such as 0.15 or 0.27. You can generally substitute one of these for a single cap in a given circuit. BEAM circuits are often bilateral (two-sided) and balanced, and in these cases try to use the same value on both sides.

  The codes below are generally found on ceramic (little round discs) and mylar (chicklet) capacitors, which are not polarized, that is, there are no positive and negative leads.

Usually the first two digits of the code represent part of the value; the third digit corresponds to the number of zeros to be added to the first two digits. This is the value in pf. Some values are usually given in uF, especially those used in BEAM applications, so I have given these as a separate column where appropriate.


VALUE(pF)   CODE            VALUE(pF)     VALUE(uF)         CODE
1.5pF                       1,000pF    .001uF             102
3.3pF                       1,500pF    .0015uF            152
10pF                        2,000pF    .002uF             202
15pF                        2,200pF    .0022uF            222
20pF                        4,700pF    .0047uF            472
30pF                        5,000pF    .005uF             502
33pF                        5,600pF    .0056uF            562
47pF                        6,800pF    .0068uF            682
56pF                                .01uF              103
68pF                                .015  
75pF                                .02                203
82pF                                .022               223
91pF                                .033               333
100pF       101                     .047               473
120pF       121                     .05                503
130pF       131                     .056               563
150pF       151                     .068               683
180pF       181                     .1                 104
220pF       221                     .2                 204
330pF       331                     .22                224
470pF       471                     .33                334
560pF       561                     .47                474
680pF       681                     .56                564
750pF       751                     1                  105
820pF       821                     2                  205



Tantalum (teardrop shaped) and electrolytic (little cans) capacitors are polarized, so you have to watch what is the positive and negative lead. They are generally higher values and usually have the value printed right on them